Brought to Order
by Lady Salazar
Summary: Capturing the legendary demon hunter Dante is a daunting task, yet one required to activate the Savior. Or maybe not: there is a back-up plan, and it involves Harry Potter. Nero origin story, AU oneshot, HPDMC crossover. PostGoF.


So, notes. This is the result of a snark on my profile during a crossover rant, which went and ate my brain. It was written over the course of a day and a half, with minimal planning. Warning for a semiexperimental writing method, present tense, and choppy flow. It's far from the best thing I've ever written. I've been told it comes across as bland, and there's definitely not much action. It's an exposition fic. It's far more ironic than anything else, so if you can point out all my subtle snarks, I'll give you a cookie. Start with the title. If you can point out the clues I planted about some of the other characters, then I'll give you a virtual cake.

I've heard that some Capcom employee verified that Nero is supposed to be Vergil's son, but I'm gleefully, shamelessly ignoring that. For one, 'descendent of Sparda's blood' to me implies a far more distant connection than grandfather and grandson, and for two... Vergil bred? With a human woman? What the hell?

Neither the Devil May Cry franchise nor the Harry Potter series belongs to me. I'm making no money off of this, yada yada yada.

* * *

_**Brought to Order**_

He doesn't remember how he got here. He doesn't even know where here is. All Harry knows is that he's in an unfamiliar place, apparently alone, and his wand is gone. It had been in his pocket when he went to sleep the previous night, toppling into bed with the characteristic reluctance of one who knows better than that he will sleep well. The previous night, Harry was at the Dursley house on Privet Drive.

Now he's... somewhere else.

Wherever he is, it's like standing in the midst of a metal donut. The unpolished iron walls dully reflect light from an unseen source, but any glare is broken up by the many vertical slits that circle the wall in rows half a meter tall. About a finger width, they are dark enough that without sticking an eyeball to it Harry can't tell how deep the slits go, or how thick the walls are. Harry's not that dumb.

He backs away to the middle of the donut. There's a circle of darker metal here, and it's slightly elevated, like once upon a time a pedestal or table or whatever may have stood there. Either way, it isn't presently, and Harry stands there with ragged nerves as he waits for something to happen. It's the furthest from the slits he can get.

It gives him enough time to dodge when something is launched straight at him. The something slices through the fabric of the too-large hand-me-down shirt like a hot knife through butter as Harry throws himself aside, rolling and coming up to look. First it's a strange bird, and then it's a sharp blade, and then Harry has to dodge again quickly as it attempts to impale him.

He hears the _wizt_ of more of the birds flying into the room, cuts back a curse, and proceeds to dodge, roll, and run more than he has in his four years at Hogwarts put together. Their sword form is useful for a few seconds before the birds revert, and he takes advantage of this to destroy as many as he can. It's almost fun until the birds get clever and start teaming up. After that, it's like playing chess with Ron. Harry can play pretty well against most people, and sometimes he thinks he's getting lucky and he might win, finally. Instead, he gets suckered and it's game over in one hit.

In this case, the hit is his right arm. Harry watches it fly off with disconnected horror, grabbing the end of his forearm with his still attached left hand in a vain, unconscious attempt to stem the blood loss.

_I'm dead_, he thinks, but it's far from over yet.

* * *

The next time he awakes from the black, Harry is in a new room that's not all that different. Oh, it's rectangular and smaller, and the walls arc with a faint glow of lavender-white energy, which feels eerily like and unlike a containment spell. It does have the same unpolished iron look and several slits. Most importantly to Harry's mind is that he still doesn't know where he is. Dudley's castoffs are gone, leaving him a little cold and naked except for the bandages on the stump of his right arm.

Whoever has him, they need him alive. That immediately crosses out Voldemort. He has yet to sense a dementor, so it probably isn't the Ministry either. Harry considers other options, but really, his list of enemies willing to commit kidnapping and attempted murder/mutilation is fairly short.

Harry consoles himself with the thought that Sirius will be looking for him as soon as the news gets out, and gets up to investigate his cell. Except for himself, it's completely bare. There's no cot to sleep in, no thoughtful article of clothing with which to cover himself, and definitely no innocuous items he could use as makeshift weapons. The only weapon Harry really knows how to use is his wand, but he can adapt. It's the only reason he's alive.

The containment field behaves like no spell he's familiar with. In reminds him more of the commercials he hears on the television when he listens in for any hint of Voldemort's activities: the ones advertising products for keeping a dog from leaving one's lawn and getting into traffic. Harry can touch the walls, but the pain it causes is excruciating. He is no stranger to pain, but neither does he enjoy it. He retreats to the center of the room and tries to go to sleep.

Sometime after this, a noise like metal scraping against metal rouses him. The containment field wavers and flares into blazing life for an instant before dying off; the pain, unprepared for, drops him nervelessly to the floor. Despite that, when a caped man in white steps in to collect him, Harry remains conscious enough to put his face to memory. The face could have been chiseled from stone in its expression of severity; the blue-brown eyes are harsh and opaque; and the longish auburn hair is touched with gray.

Harry has never seen him before in his life, but he will see him every day until he dies.

* * *

It takes a while before Harry can weasel out an explanation for his circumstances. He meets so few people it's a surprise he manages to learn anything at all. The caped man is called Petrach, and he believes the more ignorant Harry is kept the better for their plan for him. The other man he knows is called Agnus, the scientist, who proudly stutters through a grandiose explanation after a bit of digging on Harry's part.

The organization that has him is the Order of the Sword, based on an island in the Atlantic that he's never heard of called Fortuna. Apparently, they worship some demon said to have saved the human realm by betraying the Prince of Darkness, who had served for a while as a feudal lord on the island. Harry remembers Sparda from History of Magic class and passes off the worship because in his experience, every idiot wants a savior. But Agnus continues: the Order wants to create a perfect world. It wants to unleash demons on humanity so the Savior can protect them again. So that humans will bow down and worship.

"You're a bleeding madman," Harry says afterward. "What does that have to do with me?"

"Sparda is dead." Agnus leans over, getting right up in Harry's face like his scar is the most fascinating thing ever. It's creepy as hell, and that Harry is naked makes it worse. "We have our own Savior... but it is inc-incomplete. It needs Sparda's p-p-power... and his b-blood." His sword and his son, specifically. "P-P-Petrach worries we will not be able to capture Dante. So we may need a rep-replacement."

The implication is that Harry is the replacement, but while the Dursleys might consider him a freak, he is no devil and snarls that at the scientist. Agnus laughs. He takes a scalpel, carefully splitting the scar and pulling the skin apart as he studies some mad whatever before the real fun starts.

"In two thousand years..." the scientist adds, his care with the scalpel reflected in his sudden lack of stutter, "Sparda bred rarely. Two women. Five sons. Two which mingled Sparda's blood with mortal magic. While distant, demonic power buried under the weight of six hundred years of human filth..." Agnus turns the scalpel, shearing the scar tissue from Harry's forehead in a move that makes him swallow a scream. "...that is well within my abilities to correct."

Harry prays that Sirius finds him soon. Prayer, he discovers, is a waste of time.

* * *

The plan to resurrect his devil blood is simple yet effective. Break him down, by any means. The containment field in his cell is fluid, shocking him at odd times throughout the day and night, preventing restful sleep; food is scarce, alternately bland and overly spicy or sweet; a piercing squeal echoed in the cell, ringing his ears and lending a constant headache; and the air will freeze his naked body one day yet the heat will torment him the next. Sometimes the air is poisoned. It's not enough to kill him, not with his magic working overtime to bolster his failing health, but breathing becomes painful and thoughts, sluggish. He wonders if it makes him forget things, but he doesn't have a... have a... _damn_ _it_.

It works even better because Harry knows it's working. He wants this to stop.

_Power_... something in him whispers. _Give me more power_...

* * *

Petrach's stone face taunts him as he struggles under the man's boot. Harry isn't sure if the point to this exercise is to give him a target for his vicious frustration or to humiliate and aggravate him further. It succeeds at both. His heartbeat pounds sluggishly in his ears and his blood rushes painfully as he twists around, gaining purchase enough with his left arm to swing his legs around and escape the stomp.

"Not as on top of things as usual," Harry drawls, "are you?"

He rolls immediately to evade Petrach's sword, finds his feet, and turns to face him. As Petrach recovers, Harry lunges at him. The sword sweeps around in an intercepting slice. Harry knocks it aside, earning a cut on the arm for his trouble, but flips in midair to sink both feet into the man's gut. The blow makes him stumble, and irritation flashes across his face for an instant. Petrach's grip on his sword never loosens, however, and the blade comes down swiftly. Harry reaches up to catch it.

"I wonder if you are in love with pain," the man murmurs, utterly serious. Some of the blood has spattered onto his face, which doesn't bother him at all.

"Of course. She's my red queen." Harry's fist clenches around Petrach's sword, and fire burns in his veins. The next few second pass by in slow motion: Petrach attempts to withdraw his sword, yanking Harry closer instead. Magic coalesces like a phantom extension to his right stump, and the deceptively human fist nails the man in the chin, snapping his head up. "But you know..."

With a burst of strength, Harry wrenches control of the sword from Petrach. He stabs it down. His grip hold the blade at an awkward angle, but it's deep and vindictively Harry twists and tears. The sound Petrach makes is more of a choked gurgle than anything else, but Harry makes him repeat it by socking him a second time.

"She's so much more attractive when she's with someone else," he finishes disgustedly.

He can hear Agnus babbling aloud to himself about ascension and pipes pumping poison into the donut. Harry is fairly sure he wasn't expected to kill Petrach. It was only due to the arm that wasn't really an arm that it was possible. Looking down at the pale limb, Harry reminds himself that it exists only as a response to his weakness. It isn't human, though it looks and acts like it. He can't forget that.

But he does. Along with everything else.

* * *

He doesn't remember how he got here. He doesn't even know where here is. All Nero knows is that he's in an unfamiliar place, apparently alone, with nothing but his name and the clothes on his back. He sits up, feeling sore without knowing why, and brushes white hair from his eyes as he looks around. It's very bright, as light from the sun reflects off the surface of the ocean. Nero blinks hard, the glare inordinately painful, and looks away. He isn't on a beach but a cliff overlooking one. On his left there is a hundred-foot drop; on his right the ground slants down and away, a carpet of green that eventually fades away into sand. Looking to the right and behind, he can see in the distance a slate gray road snaking through the green. Further out, buildings knife the blue sky.

Nothing of what he sees lends a clue to how he got there, but standing around won't help. Nero takes off at a jog toward the town in the distance. He nearly stumbles but catches himself, scowling. His body feels strange, like it doesn't fit his skin, but he brushes it off and keeps going. It gets more comfortable as he moves.

Nero barely reaches the road before he stops, instinct warning him that there are dangers around that weren't there a second ago. He scans the horizon but whatever it is isn't there. Behind him is clear as well when he turns to look. He performs a quick side-roll and paranoia is rewarded; an ax blade slams home on the stone where Nero had stood.

"Well, aren't you pretty," he comments. A part of him recognizes the attacker as a demon. It's a hodgepodge of parts, sewed together and inflated like a balloon, all soft and squishy except for the ax blade attached where the right arm should be. And it's not alone.

Nero isn't armed, so he tears the blade from his first attacker and throws himself into motion. These things are easy kills, downed in a single slash or boot to the face, and they hit like old women. He feels like this should be harder, because don't humans devil hunt on hell or hell mode? It's hardly worth the effort to dodge. Despite that he keeps moving, tearing through one after another, and after a few minutes he's joined by a couple of sword-wielding men in white. Nero has a momentary wild urge to attack them instead. Something about them just rubs him the wrong way. He shakes it off, however.

"You're fairly skilled, even if you're not from the Order," one states. The voice sounds familiar. "Who are you?"

"Who's asking?"

Though momentarily nonplussed, the man introduces himself as Credo.

* * *

Nero never works how just how he arrived at Fortuna, but he settles there easily enough. It's made easier since he remembers no place else. Walking down the business district leaves him feeling an odd sense of deja vu, while the residential district makes him uncomfortable and crowded. Nero likes people well enough, but they stare at his hair and his face like he's a new exhibit at the zoo and it sets his teeth to grinding.

There are some exceptions. From the beginning, Credo is more interested in getting a proper sword in his hand and recruiting him for the Order of the Sword than anything else. Nero is initially reluctant, though in the face of his nonexistent options he decides to join with one condition. He will not touch their uniform. He refuses to wear white.

"Why?" Kyrie asks one day. Nero met Credo's sister first by accident, and since then the sheltered girl invites him to dinner, to walks, and once to an opera performance. She tries to get him to attend church, too. She hasn't managed it yet.

She might soon, though. Nero likes her kind-spoken words and lack of prejudgment. It helps that she's cute as she stands there in her white dress with an inquiring look. He doesn't mind white on her.

There's no good answer to her question. The idea of donning the Order's white makes him feel ill. So he simply smirks at her. "I already have white hair, Kyrie. And that uniform? All that white on white would just really wash me out."

Kyrie laughs into her hand and smiles at him. She recognizes a dodged question and leaves it at that, walking silently beside him. Best of all, Kyrie knows when not to push. Credo should take lessons. Hell, the whole Order should take lessons. Nero's tired of having to explain himself. Like earlier, when the man took one look at the modifications Nero made to his sword. That's why he and Kyrie are out here now, giving Credo time to cool down.

"She's only the Red Queen if she's one of a kind," he says, returning to the topic. "I don't understand why he got so pissed. Mods never bothered him before."

She blinks, surprised by the abrupt change of gears. "It wasn't the changes that made my brother angry, Nero," says Kyrie. A flash of sadness appears in her eyes. "It's the name. Our father was once captain of the holy knights before Credo took the position... he was killed in the line of duty a few months before you appeared. His Holiness called the devil that killed him the Red Queen."

What a way to put his foot in his mouth, Nero thinks, but there's no way he could have known. The name simply feels right. He has no plans to change it. "And it doesn't bother you?"

"I think it fits," she replies, smiling again. "It's... comforting to know that while the Red Queen killed my father, she is now a weapon against evil."

A slight smile fights its way onto Nero's face. Credo can go to hell; the Red Queen is staying the Red Queen.

* * *

Nero's favorite place on Fortuna Island is ironically the cliff where he first woke there. Knowing this, Kyrie often directs their walks there, and he will stand out on the brink a whisper away from a hundred-foot drop into raging undertow and feel the rush of the wind in his hair while she sets up a picnic lunch. This has become a weekly pastime; Credo is so often busy lately that both are left to their own devices more and more often.

It is something Nero looks forward to after an hour of trying not to snore through Sanctus' services. Because he likes the place and enjoys Kyrie's company more, he relaxes his guard more than he should. He tells Kyrie about the last mission he was on. Although he's been part of the Order for over three years now, Nero never leaves the island; he cleans up the messes that are occasionally belched out of the resident Hellgate, no small task, but one that gets boring after a while. He frankly wonders why the Order is so devout in worshiping a demon that left behind such a leaky seal.

"Nero!" Though she is scandalized by the comment, it causes Kyrie to muffle a laugh. "It's talk like that that keeps you here," she teases. "His Holiness is afraid to send such a shameless heretic as an apostle."

"This heretic can kick Credo's ass," Nero reminds her, smirking. He's not sure if that's exactly true. The last time they sparred, he could have sworn that the captain of the holy knights had been seriously pulling his punches. Nero just doesn't know why Credo would bother.

Kyrie begins to put away the remnants of their lunch. Nero closes his eyes, listening to the crashing of the waves against the cliff wall and feeling inordinately peaceful. The past doesn't matter if he can live like this.

Behind him, he hears a sharp intake of breath and a soft thump of a woven basket falling to the ground.

"Kyrie?"

"Nero!"

He turns around, and whatever peace he was feeling shatters in an instant. A horde of scarecrow demons crowds around. Kyrie backs toward him slowly, trying not to invite an attack, but the foremost one lunges at her anyway.

"Kyrie!" The Blue Rose is out in a flash and fires, blasting the attacker into smoke. Nero follows the bullet, revving Red Queen. The blade sinks deep into one demon, hanging there, and he sweeps her around in an arc that dusts some more. The scarecrow flies off the edge of the cliff, past Kyrie, and past five demons that look for easier prey than him. "Kyrie!" he screams again, abandoning his sword to leap over and between them.

An ax lays open his right arm, and Kyrie screams. The wound burns and bleeds sluggishly as Nero buries his fist in the demon's face. It flies back, flipping in the air and landing ax-first on the Red Queen. It puffs into smoke, but the exceed mechanism is crushed. Nero swears virulently under his breath. It is one thing to threaten him, but it is another thing threaten Kyrie and damage the Red Queen. He wants the demons to suffer.

_Power..._ a voice echoes from the depths of memory. _Give me more power_...

In the face of his aggravation, the remaining demons are roadkill. Kyrie insists they rush back to the town to get his arm treated, Nero collects his sword in a hurry, and they leave the cliff and its once soothing atmosphere behind.

There's nothing to be done for his arm except to wrap and let it heal on its own... but it heals wrong.

* * *

He's been feeling a sense of disconnected horror since he discovered Agnus' lab, a place and person that makes his imaginary hackles rise at the mere thought. The scientist's fascination with his arm is creepy as all hell, and even creepier because it invokes a painful feeling of deja vu. Now Credo appears, face locked in an expression that could have been carved from stone. Nero is filled with a fervent irrational desire to lash out, to shatter that implacable stoicism in any manner possible.

For a second, Nero wants to kill him; then he remembers that Credo is Kyrie's brother, even if he's hiding dirty Order secrets. Moreover, before all this, Nero considered Credo a friend.

"Huh," he says, not obeying the itch in his fingers to draw Red Queen. "That's a look you shoot your enemy."

But soon it's clear that to Credo, that's exactly what Nero is.

Nero wins the following fight, but as Agnus flies off he fears he's lost Kyrie forever.

* * *

When it's all over, Nero and Kyrie pack up another picnic basket and head for the cliff. Words aren't necessary. Everything that needs to be said already has, and now they look for a second of peace before thrusting themselves back into action. Fortuna City is trashed. Many of the population is left homeless, and if work isn't done soon, food and hygiene will become a problem. Worse still is that without the Order of the Sword and the Church of Sparda, the townspeople are left frightened and confused. Nero is the last, and they look to him for guidance.

The people want a savior. Nero wants nothing of that.

Kyrie sets out the modest meal she prepared. It's nothing more than simple sandwiches, but Nero enjoys the experience more then he did any of the Order's holiday feasts. He and Kyrie trade off bites, him smirking and her muffling laughter as they feed each other their sandwiches piece by small piece. Remembering their last visit, Nero keeps an eye out for danger, but it's unnecessary; since the destruction of the Hellgate, no new demons have appeared. It's just a matter of picking off the stragglers.

When they finish, Nero gets to his feet and moves to the edge of the cliff. The memory of the stale, stagnant air inside the Savior makes him appreciate the breeze even more. He rests there for a moment.

Kyrie breaks the silence. "Nero, do you ever wonder where you came from?"

He pauses. "I used to." Now, when Nero wonders, he thinks back to how familiar he found Agnus and his lab. Demon or not, he doesn't want to consider the details.

"Do you ever wish you could go back?"

"What?"

"You always liked standing there," Kyrie says. "Right on the edge, feeling the wind like it can pick you up and fly you away. I always wondered... if you wished it would take you home."

Nero turns around. Kyrie meets his eyes with a look of gentle inquiry.

He never thought about the wind in those terms, but when he considers it, it's true. He can strain his memory all he likes. The effort invokes nothing more than an impression of scarlet and gold. Standing on the cliff edge in the high wind resurrects an old, almost primal thrill. A part of him loves flying, and it finds its home in the air.

That ache subsides entirely when Kyrie smiles at him. Nero has no desire to go searching for a past when he is looking at his future.

"I am home," he says. The past is dead.

* * *

It's been five years now. Five whole years of the world turning inside out. Dumbledore's long given up on Harry to focus on the war. So have everyone else. They've even held a memorial. Harry's listed as dead.

The spells say he's still alive.

Sirius leans over an old parchment map of the Atlantic Ocean. He managed to narrow the search down this far by resorting to old, half-forgotten spells of questionable origin, and now he's resorting to another. It's a barbaric form of crystal scrying; if anyone found out what he's done to set up the groundwork for this spell, Sirius would become intimately reacquainted with his old cell in Azkaban. He doesn't care. He casts.

The pointer lands on an island called Fortuna.

Slowly, Sirius begins to smile.


End file.
